Hollywood Teams Up With Netflix, Amazon to Fight Piracy

Major Hollywood studios are forming a new coalition to fight piracy, roping in Netflix Inc. and Amazon.com Inc. to share the burden of combating illegal copying and distribution of movies and TV shows.

Thirty content creators including Walt Disney Co., Viacom Inc.’s Paramount Pictures Corp., Sony Entertainment and Warner Bros. are joining in the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment, or ACE, according to a statement released Tuesday. ACE will expand on efforts by the Motion Picture Association of America, which represents the studios and is led by former Senator Chris Dodd.

Piracy is a key focus for the studio association, with the group supporting the bipartisan bill to give the president the authority to nominate the Copyright Office head. The Motion Picture Association of America estimated that in 2005 piracy cost the major U.S. motion-picture studios $6.1 billion, a number that hasn’t been updated since.

“Global piracy is not just a concern for one studio or creator, it undermines the foundation of the entire global entertainment sector,” Dodd said in the statement. “Meeting the challenges ahead will require more voices, greater collaboration, new ideas, and increased resources. ACE, with its broad coalition of creators from around the world, is designed, specifically, to leverage the best possible resources to reduce piracy.”

ACE aims to conduct research, work closely with law enforcement and share the burden of filing civil litigation to protect intellectual property, according to the statement.